


Sleepless Nights

by verumbark



Series: D-End 2 Rescue AU [2]
Category: Zero Escape (Video Games), Zero Escape: Zero Time Dilemma - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Sibling Fluff, ZTD SPOILERS, cw for the normal kind of stuff you might find in a zero escape game, delta is way too hard on himself, fluff without (much) plot, fluffer (fluff but also suffer), just so you know this is basically the only thing i will write about ever, phi is a sweet child and she deserves to be happy, read the first one in the series if you want a better understanding of this, seriously this spoils so much, them scare
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-12
Updated: 2016-09-12
Packaged: 2018-08-14 14:44:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8018068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verumbark/pseuds/verumbark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She was right to be scared of him, he thought. He was dangerous. He had the temper of a child, enough emotional baggage to break his frail little back, and the potential to destroy the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sleepless Nights

**Author's Note:**

> i told yall there would be more so Here It Is™ some good old fashioned suffering with everyones fave twins,
> 
> also that whole conversation abt shifting is 100% foreshadowing and someones gonna scream in th morning if i decide to get off my lazy ass and write more

On the other side of the twins’ bedroom window, the sky was a beautiful canopy of black speckled with stars. They didn’t open it at night so often in the winter; Delta, being on the top bunk, always got the worst part of the drafts that blew in, and he’d usually end up coming down with one thing or another. Even with it open, though, they wouldn’t hear much but the far-off sound of tires on pavement. Theirs was a sleepy neighborhood. They loved living in it, but some nights they couldn’t even fool themselves into feeling safe. Some nights just felt _wrong_.

This was one of those nights. The only sound was the faint ticking of the analog clock on the wall, and the night-light below it collaborated with the moon to paint the atmosphere an eerie blue. The air around them felt ominously heavy. Neither Phi nor Delta could manage to drift off to sleep. For Delta, this was an ordinary nightly occurrence, and he showed no outward signs of distress as he stared intently at the hand-drawn “decorations” on the ceiling that his sister had happily contributed without their parents’ permission. She, on the other hand, was having a harder time dealing with her racing imagination. Part of her wished she could see everything that Delta saw with those weird powers of his, even if it would have meant suffering in the same way; for someone as creative as herself, not knowing exactly what had happened was probably much worse. She was going crazy visualizing the scenes that the rest of her family had refused to tell her much about for her own good. She couldn’t stop trying to imagine what it must have felt like to burn to death in that incinerator, or to feel her skin corrode and melt off her bones amidst a merciless downpour of acid. And to eventually realize that the person responsible for it all was her own twin brother… all of it felt worse every time she thought about it. It got to the point where the fear she felt was unbearable. Trembling despite the warmth provided by her fluffy blanket, she weakly kicked the bottom of Delta’s mattress to see if that would get his attention.

“Psst. Delta. You awake?” Phi’s voice was but an anxious whisper, yet with no louder sounds to hear, it seemed to fill the room with her barely-concealed despair.

Above her, Delta turned on his side, holding back his own feelings for her sake. “Always,” came his response. “Phi, it’s--” He checked the time on the analog clock. “It’s after midnight. You should try to sleep.”

“But I can’t sleep. I’m too scared.”

He sighed. “D’you wanna go get Mom and Dad together? I bet they’ll let you sleep in their room again if you ask.”

“No, I don’t wanna bother them.” Phi pulled the covers up further, but she couldn’t stop shaking. “Can you just… talk to me for a little bit?” _Even though I’m scared of you?_ she thought but didn’t dare say. The pause before his reply told her that her brother had heard it anyway.

“… Sure. Let me come down there first, okay?”

“Okay.”

Delta slid off the side of his bunk and made a soft, silent landing on the carpet below. “Here, um…” Instead of sitting down next to her, he headed for his dresser. He returned with his old bluebird necklace. The chain was still broken from when he tore it off before running away last year, but the pendant, which he placed beside her pillow, was still fully functional. “You can… yeah. I know it helps you get to sleep sometimes. What’d you wanna talk about?”

She grabbed the necklace and nervously began to fidget with it. “I’ve been thinking about… what happened before we were born.”

“I know. I’m really sorry, Phi. I shouldn’t have told you. You didn’t deserve all--”

“No, no, I’m… glad you did. I just… sometimes I wish it hadn’t happened.”

“What do you mean?” He frowned. “We wouldn’t have been born if it hadn’t happened. There would’ve been a time paradox.”

“That’s just it, though. Were we really worth all that? Nine… ten people-- no, _six billion people_ dying a billion times, again and again, just so Mom and Dad could… y’know? We’re just two people. It just… it doesn’t add up, Delta.”

His eyes widened with concern, and he placed his pale hand on top of hers. “Don’t. Don’t think like that. Don’t you dare. You’ll end up blaming yourself. It isn’t your fault, and you matter a lot to me, okay?”

“Hypocrite,” she muttered.

He didn’t know how to respond to that. She was right, of course. That way of thinking was what kept him up so often. It was wrong, and he knew it, but he did blame himself for what happened at Dcom. He hated himself for it even though his family always acted like it had never happened. He hated his stupid fucking powers for letting him know everything that had happened and letting him do everything that he had done. Worst of all, though, his hatred was constantly overwhelmed by fear that he would turn out the same way as his older self.

“Yeah.” Phi somehow managed to sound both smug and miserable. “I thought so.”

“Phi, stop it right now.”

“Delta, _you_ stop it. Take your own advice. That whole thing wasn’t your fault either.”

Now he was getting frustrated. “Yeah, but it _was_ \--”

“That whole thing wasn’t you. That was someone else. I know you’d never do that to anyone, no matter what happens. Believe me, I know you aren't--”

“Oh, really?" He was more than just a little angry now, the self-established seal on his emotions beginning to slip. “Now who’s lying, Phi? I _know_ what you’re thinking. You’re just as scared of me as I am!”

She flinched when he raised his voice, and she scrambled to sit up, one tense finger held to her lips. “Shh--!”

“No! You’re scared that I’ll grow up and-- and--”

“ _Delta!_ ”

“-- something horrible to you or hurt Mom and Dad or-- or destroy the world just to watch it--”

“Calm down! You’ll--”

“-- a terrorist that might not even be real or whatever the fuck his reason was, and you just lie and hide it from me ‘cause you think I can’t tell! I can _read minds_ , Phi! Remember!?”

“D-Delta, _stop!_ Please stop! You’re…” She tried in vain to blink back her tears, reaching out to grab his hand again and holding it tight enough to hurt them both. “You’re really scary when you get mad like that.”

His breathing slowed, and his rage gradually gave way to horror. She was right to be scared of him, he thought. He was dangerous. He had the temper of a child, enough emotional baggage to break his frail little back, and the potential to destroy the world. It took everything he had not to cry. Her nails dug into the palm of his hand as if her life depended on it; he squeezed his eyes shut at the pain, but he was grateful that she was there to pull him back to reality. “I’m so sorry,” he finally managed to choke out. “I just hate this so fucking much.”

“I-it’s okay. I’m here.” Phi had wrapped her arms around her brother’s shoulders before she knew what she was doing, but she had done it of her own free will, and she could tell he appreciated it. “We can… look out for each other, right? I know you’re on my side.” She glanced at the door. “I hope you didn’t wake Mom and Dad up,” she whispered nervously.

There was another brief period of silence as the twins listened for any kind of sound from outside. Once more, they only heard the ticking of the analog clock on the wall. They exhaled deeply in relief.

“Phi?”

“Huh?”

“If… if something happens to me and… I have to do something bad… or if something happens to you and you have to SHIFT away…”

“I won’t forget you, Delta.”

“You promise?”

“On my life.”

A cold chill ran down the boy’s spine. He instinctively held his sister tighter; he suddenly felt like he might never see her again the moment he let go. “Don’t you even joke like that. It… it could happen. You or Mom or Dad… I really, really don’t want to lose any of you.”

“What about you?”

“I’m… not like you guys. I can’t SHIFT. My consciousness is safe where it is.”

“Oh. Well, at least you’re safe,” she sighed shakily, feeling lighter than usual as he loosened his grip again. “But are you sure? Didn’t you say, um… those two guys… the ice cream man and the serial killer could SHIFT at the end, even though they weren’t Espers? What if something like that happens to you?”

There was a long pause as Delta went over his borrowed memories. She was right again. There were situations where his other self could have SHIFTed. But there was no way he would ever let her worry like that. He wouldn’t cross that bridge until he found himself in the heat of the desert sun with Carlos pointing a gun at his head. “No,” he lied with confidence, “that couldn’t have happened to me back there. And there aren’t enough other Espers here for it to happen now. You should be more worried about yourself than me, okay? I know I am.”

“But what if--”

“Phi.”

“Delta…”

“You should go to sleep. We have school tomorrow.”

Phi shuddered. “But I’m too scared.”

Delta let go of her and sat back, his expression back to its usual state of seriousness. He reached for the pendant behind her, then took her hand and placed it in her palm. “Just… listen to the music box. And I’ll stay right next to you. I won’t let anything hurt you.”

Phi took the pendant and wound it up as she spoke. “How’ll you do that, though? Can you use those powers to hold my mind down in case it wants to go anywhere?”

“I just won’t let anything hurt you. Don’t worry. You’ll be right here when you wake up in the morning.”

“ _If_ I wake up.” As that familiar song began to play, its simple tune seeming to harmonize with the ticking of the clock, Phi’s body climbed awkwardly back into bed and lay down without the input of her mind. It was a funny feeling to her, but she was glad her brother had enough control over his powers to do something like that without hurting her. That at least put one of her worries to rest.

“You’ll wake up. I promise,” he whispered. “And you’ll wake up here, in this room, and I’ll be here too. Mom and Dad will be here, and Mom’s making… pumpkin waffles for breakfast. Close your eyes — before I close them for you — and just… try to think about happy things.”

He didn’t need to ask her twice. She did as she was told, sinking deeper into a cozy mess of blankets and pillows. “Thanks a lot for caring about me. That… might’ve sounded sarcastic, but… I meant it.”

“I know. Pleasant dreams, Phi.”

“G’night.”

Delta didn’t move from his sister’s side that night until she fell asleep.


End file.
